Hello! I recently dowsized from 1/1 to about 1.2/1 and i was very nervous for the first jump due to all the hype on downsizing on here. On that first jump i noticed i was moving much faster and turns were much more responsive, but it was in a good way. I was craving a little more speed and snap out of my old canopy. Basically im just curious if and when your downsize actually scared the sh*t out of you. One of my previous instructors said it was when he went down one size AND went fully eliptical. Story time?

I don't know about scared shitless, but when I went from my saber 150 to a Samurai 120 I was pretty nervous about it on the first jump. Everything about it had me on edge. The opening wad twitchy, I could actually turn with just the harness input. Once I came in for landing and the power from the flare it had I knew I was in good hands. It was a great canopy. But it make me a little nervous the first time I jumped it.

My first jump on a high aspect ratio elliptical, a Katana 150. I downsized from a Stiletto 170 about three years ago, conscious of my taking two steps at a time (one step down in size and one step across design types). I had over 4000 jumps, and had a ton of recent CP coaching under my belt.

I had a funky bag launch and a weird "trap door" kind of opening, and it spun up putting me on my back. I could not recover from it and cut it away. My first step onto the swooping trail had resulted in a cutaway.

I learned a lot about the way to put the bag into my V3, and about how to handle line twists on canopies like that. I have had twists more recently but have used a technique I initially got from Phreezone to recover from them.

The coaching and downsizing continued . . . I downsized my body as well, and I am now jumping a Velo 111 and Velo 103.

Haven't had one that "scared" me, but the downsize from a Spectre 190 to a Spectre 170 was interesting because of the extra speed on landing. My first jump yesterday on my new Sabre2 135 from a 150 was just as interesting because of how much noticeably faster it was flying in full flight. Haven't had an "OH SHIT!" moment on a new canopy yet.

220 student canopy to 150 square ft Sabre was pretty scary, but not as scary as 150 to a 132 after having broken my leg on said 150.

Man, what we go through just for the sake of looking cool.

I was terrified of that canopy the first 50 jumps, then I found out that it was quite docile, and soon downsized to a 124, and then to a 111, which I've jumped now for 400, maybe time for new HMA lines.

I'm not scared of any size canopy now, but I know that the 111 is probably the smallest I should go with my jump numbers (i'm light, so I don't load it heavily), so I'll keep that.

With some more experience, downsized will be less scary, and downsizes on the same model canopy are easier and safer than downsizes to a more aggressive type of canopy. I've owned three different sizes of Pilot, and even though the smaller ones were faster, they all flew and handled in much the same way.

If you make a downsize and it scares you then you were either not ready or you made too big of a jump in terms of size or canopy design.

Although I did just remember a great story from an old-school DZ.commer who was a static line instructor a bit over 10 years ago at a small 182 DZ. He grabbed a staff rig which was supposed to have a Heatwave 170 in it and took a load of students up, put them out, landed with the plane and took a second load of students up and followed the last student out. His story continues that when he deployed all he could see was the slider. He pushed the slider forward to look at the canopy and it was ridiculously small. If I remember the story right, it was a Heatwave 97 (or close to it). His story continued to say that he decided not to chop it since the canopy wasn't a malfunction and he wasn't sure how big the reserve was and that he started to feel confident that he would land it safely until he unstowed the brakes and hit Mach 1. He said his landing pattern was one big final approach because he was scared to turn it below 1000ft and he was going to slide it out until a foot caught and tossed him ass over heels down the landing area. Kris walked away from the landing but his personal beer light turned on early that day!

The downsize which scared me was my first one. I went from a 280 to a 210, exit weight 160. When the canopy inflated after static line I thought I'd just try a left tu- OH MY GOD WHY AM I POINTING AT THE GROUND AND IN HALF A LINE TWIST.

Yea I know just what you mean.... I did my first on a T-10 and my second was on the PC and everyone was in fuss about not having the 50 jumps to use a PC... freaking out till the canopy opened and i realized.... WTF was the fuss all about...LOL

Basically im just curious if and when your downsize actually scared the sh*t out of you

Quote:

I was working at eagle creek skydiving in Oregon and the owner had a small canopy hung up for inspection and said - go jump this n tell me if it flys ok.

it didnt look very big hung up, so eyeballing it I was like....uhhh, ok, what is it? he replied its an 85 icarus fx I took in trade.

uhhhh, I'm jumping a stiletto at 1.5 - 1 Ralph, that hankie will put me over 2-1 AND its xbraced...

after enduring some nudging, name calling and general questions about my manhood - combined with some soul searching I finally decided to take it for a spin - I was experienced with swooping and CRW so.... after all people with half my jumps are flying these and can still walk I figured.

geared up and waiting for the plane I got the worst case of the nerves ever.... walked over to Ralph and told him if it scared the shit outta me I was gonna chop it and he could go find it cuz I was going to follow the freebag.

the pre jump nerves were horrible, I was second guessing myself all the way to 10k *(for a hop n pop) "what the fuck am I doing?" ran through my head many times... the opening, flight and landing were really good - the landing was straight in from 1k.... my mantra I had was "dont turn, dont build speed...no speed....full flight but no speed- followed by "holy shit this is fast!!!"- to a tiptoe landing (not what I had been expecting since there was only a 2mph wind)

on my stiletto I had completed all billvon's checklist, but on this thing I was definately out of my comfort zone, it was a huge downsize plus a change in canopy type.

I put three or four jumps on it that day then over 50 that month exploring its potential - doing so many hop n pops that everyone was laughing at me saying that i was scared to play with them

I had 1200 jumps at the time of my first flight and have owned it ever since.

It was fun in the old days when you could downsize any way you wanted and nobody would give you any hassle. (Mind you, one didn't plan to start hucking big swoop turns.)

As for wing loading when a canopy starts to get exciting, it seems to me to be around 1.2.

Story time? OK, these were the bit scary downsizes for me:

a) jump 33. I had been on rental Mantas with about 3 jumps on smaller 240-250 canopies, when an experienced jumper tried to sell me a Firelite 172 in a rig with a 22' low speed reserve. Even in 1991 that sounded stupid, but I put a jump on the gear. The canopy was very responsive so I flew it gently but the landing turned out fine since there was a ton of wind that day.

b) jumps 205-208 on a Jonathan 92 (1.8 loading) when I only had a dozen jumps on canopies under 200 sq ft, with the smallest being two jumps on a Sabre 120 (1.4 loading). Exciting! Running out the imperfectly timed flares was a bit tough on the ankles but all else was fine even on no wind hot summer days.

That's the old school way to downsize: Do at least two jumps on a canopy to get the hang of the flare and you're good, jump down two sizes if you want, and don't worry about square vs. elliptical

c) At jump 550, after only 90 jumps at 1.2 loading or more, when I usually jumped accuracy canopies, I borrowed an FX 88. That first crossbraced jump was interesting. Pop the brakes and it felt like the floor had dropped out; those canopies dive so much more. With the wind noise it felt like for the first time I'd need ear plugs for the canopy ride. The crazy descent rate (as it then seemed) did require close attention to flaring, but at least one had the speed to have time to adjust the flare. The first few flares were wobbly -- never before had I had to flare quite as evenly with both hands to avoid diving to the side.

Back in the day I was jumping a 175 Falcon and had put a more than a few jumps on 150 and 135 ZP parachutes (Nova, Batwing, Monarch, Stiletto). The PD rep showed up one day and I decided to demo a 120 Stiletto.

When it opened I looked up and thought - DAMN! THAT THING IS SMALL!!

I was shocked at just how small a parachute could be! It was a genuine surprise.

In that instant I was genuinely worried that I had bitten off more than I could chew...how can I land such a small parachute!??!

I settled my nerves, did the controlability check and prepared myself for a fast and exciting parachute flight, which it was.

I followed the pattern and landed right on target and wow, it felt like a tremendous surf - the lift, surge and power of the toggle stroke was so powerful. And I tiptoed the landing!

so last august I turn up in the sates in August with 55 jumps over 2 years and a try 150. Check out/recurrency they put me on a 220 nab or something of that nature and then back to the 150 tri... next 4 months I do 400 jumps on the canopy and get really bored. The opportunity to demo a pilot 124 comes up and with the thumbs up from a bunch of people I give it a whirl, not bad, the 150 seemed horrible now so I saw a pilot 117 come up and out a few hundred more on that. Needing a second rig for work one day I am offered a 111 pilot so I jump that, often loaded around 2 when wearing ~20lb of lead... then things get interesting...

A 91 sense is floating around the DZ and a few people are suggesting I take it for a spin, i laugh and think nah it will kill me...few more months several hundred more jumps wear on and I'm still getting nagged and looks like I'll be working a windy dz in a few months so a highly loaded canopy would be nice so I borrow an FX99...open, pop the breaks, fly it round...seems very docile and not what I expected. So with my one jump on the 99 I decided Ill pick a nice calm day gentle wind and take the 91 up (loaded right on 2). Open, pop the breaks, O this is different, fuck this is fast, compared to the 99 this thing is fast and falls fast. Start playing with it it seems good so up comes the landing deep breath.... and shit this isn't so bad. Have a bunch of jumps on it now, taken it to a demo, stomped some discs on it and generally love it. While i wouldn't say it was scary I would say it kept me on my toes and made me very aware of what I was doing on each and every canopy ride which I think is a good thing